Collapse the Universes
by FantasyMother
Summary: A sequel to Across the Universes.  Years later a message shows up, the Volturi Brothers get involved, and to everyone's surprise they realize destruction of the journal has not stopped the madness.  B&E, and others, Rated M for Lemons and future content.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight and its characters. I own Ed, the journal, and that little square that moved through the accelerator.

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Collapse the Universes

Chapter 1 – The Prologue

In the end, it was simple. Opening the delicate lead-wrapped package took precision tools, but it wasn't insurmountable. Inside, carefully etched on the surface of the lead, was a series of numbers visible only under magnification. The Edmund Scientific microscope gathering dust in the corner of my bedroom worked quite nicely - once I took it apart so I could fit what was left of the ½ inch square packet under the lens.

The code was based on the first 127 pages of Pride and Prejudice, using the first letter of each paragraph. Once we numbered the paragraphs, and it took 127 pages worth of paragraphs, we had the letters we needed to decipher it. Mom was the one who had the breakthrough after researching various ways of encrypting messages. If the Bella in the other universe was virtually a mirror of herself, perhaps her favorite book was used as the key? It was a flash of brilliance.

_Or something._

The message was a simple greeting with no anticipation of the probability of a reply. My existence seemed to have been conjured up by the Alice of their world, although how she was able to have cross-universal visions was beyond our understanding. Fuck, like we were going to understand _any_ of this.

How it got into the accelerator, I could only conjecture. I knew the CERN team was involved in ground-breaking research and could only assume that, once again, this aspect of our worlds mirrored. Perhaps Edward Cullen did nothing more than take a chance that in the moment of collision this physical object would transport to a universe that had already been connected to their own. If Mr. Volturi was right, it had happened again, and again. Maybe there was something special about these two particular universes, or maybe this happened all the time – twin existences touching and retracting, touching and retracting.

Course, I wasn't even considering how Cullen got near the accelerator at all.

Rubbing my eyes, I willed my pounding head to stop its drumbeat while I tapped my fingers on my physics book. I'd been skimming anything I could find on the latest and strangest theories associated with quantum mechanics but had come up with nothing - nada. Some of the math I could handle, some of it wouldn't be decipherable to me until I hit some senior level classes, and my patience was running dry.

It was the smell of roasting chicken that pulled me out of my head. Groaning, I shoved the book aside and got to my feet. It was close to dinnertime, and I should be downstairs looking like I was helping. Even though dad wasn't due back from his shift at the hospital for another hour, I knew mom would mention if I gave her a hand, and right now anything to keep dad happy was a good thing. I'd never seen him so tense. _Ever._

Shuffling to the door I flung it open, only to be surprised to see my father standing at the end of the upstairs hallway, facing the wall.

"Dad?"

He whipped around, eyes going wide when he saw me standing in the doorway. His hands grazing the wall - faltering, disoriented, he took a hesitant step forward, right into a shaft of light shining through a bedroom door, breaking through the dust motes dancing in the beam. As soon as he took that step the walls around him broke into a swirling array of rainbow colored light, a kaleidoscope illuminating the hallway.

_What the fuck_… I squinted at my father, trying to see past the light show while my brain rushed through various explanations for why it looked like a prism had lit the house. We made eye contact, and it felt like the world shifted on its axis. Grabbing the door jam I tried to steady myself, the floor rushing up at me, my stomach rising to my throat as everything went wrong – up wasn't up and down wasn't down and I tried not to scream when I saw them… when I saw his eyes. Dad's eyes not their normal green, but a glowing gold as I watched him shudder, turn left, and walk right through the wall.

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A/N *Waves*

Just so y'all know, this wasn't planned. I really did intend to leave the future-take where it was – with lots of open questions. Then Antiaol found the fic, and suddenly plot bunnies started dancing in my head.

So you can either blame her, or thank her

And, this time I'm not jumping without a parachute. Booksgalore/Bookishqua is beta'ing this little ditty, and I'd like to thank her in advance for putting up with the whining we both know is coming.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: SM owns what's hers, I own what's mine. Sorta. We can debate another time :-)**

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**Chapter 2**

_**EAM POV**_

"How long has he been out?"

Bella pulled her eyes away from Ed's pale face, pain and fear contorting her beautiful features as my compulsion to protect them both threatened to overwhelm my need for calm. I took a deep breath, trying to still my heart that insisted on pounding a staccato beat in sympathy with hers.

"I don't know," she whispered. "I shouted for him because I needed a hand with something on a top shelf. When he didn't answer, I came up here… and found him like this."

Pulse strong, skin cool and clammy – it was the strong pulse that ruled out shock. He appeared to have fainted, but… why?

I adjusted the blanket Bella had thrown over him - he was far too heavy for her to even consider moving from the hallway floor. She'd raised his feet and placed a small pillow under his head, and until I had more facts my years of medical training were worth shit as I watched my healthy son lay unconscious on the hardwood floor.

Her soft whimper drew me to her. Wrapping my arm around Bella's shoulders and pulling her close I breathed in deeply, desperate for her gentle scent to relax me as I tried to think of anything I could to ease our fears. Suddenly the dam broke as sobs shook her body, fingers grasping my shirt, clinging to the fabric as if it was the only thing that kept her from falling to the floor right next to our son. Holding her tightly, I whispered soothing and meaningless words, pushing back my own growing terror, the intuitive sense something about this felt familiar. I couldn't allow myself to lose it - right now my first priority was to be husband, father, and doctor.

"Shit."

We both jumped, Bella pulling out of my arms with a gasp as we both looked down. Ed lay there, eyes open and blinking against the bright light from the overhead bulb. I stood and lunged for the switch, quickly flipping it off and returning to his side.

"What happened?" Bella had his hand clasped tightly in her own, her fear replaced with concern. Over the years I'd gotten used to the bizarre fact she and I didn't appear to age, yet here we are with a full grown son. If he didn't look so much like her, you'd think she was his girlfriend instead of his mother… and I swallowed the sharp pang of jealously before it had a chance to take root. Our son was breathtakingly handsome, and it wasn't the first time I'd felt this irrational bite. If I had the guts to ever admit it to anyone, I'd find myself on a therapist's couch trying to explain why the father was afraid of an Oedipal complex when his wife was the epitome of devoted spouse. Course, sometimes I remembered the times I was jealous of a vampire writing in a book. I'd be the first to admit I wasn't the most rational guy around.

"I don't kn… Dad?" he focused his eyes on me, his voice a quiet rasp. "Dad, were you here earlier?"

_What the fuck? No, no, no,_ this is not what I wanted to hear. My blood turned to ice because no, this wasn't going to fucking happen again. But the feeling, the _knowing _clawed inside me, tearing its way out to bring with it the full realization the nightmare was going to start again.

But right now, my job was to detach, and although this was my son I had to allow medical training to take over – remain objective, not panic, assess facts. I kept my face blank. Sort of.

"No, Ed, I just got home a few minutes ago." I gulped, hesitated, but knew I had to ask.

"Why?"

"He was here." Ed was calm, he was lucid, his pupils reacted normally, he wasn't hallucinating…

"Who?" Bella looked from Ed to me; her eyes growing wide as she quickly put the pieces together that had already fused in my own mind. "Where?"

Ed rolled to his side and sat up; his knees pulled up to his chin, and pointed down the hall. "There," he whispered, "You were, I mean he was there. He looked at me, and then turned." Taking a deep breath he wrapped his arms around his knees tighter, drawing them closer to his folded body. "He turned, and then walked through the wall."

Shooting to my feet I turned the switch back on, the hallway blazing in bright incandescent light. We all turned to look, and as one, our jaws dropped.

Inching my way slowly down the hall, each step as careful as if I might take one too many and fall off a cliff, I made my way bit by bit… and stopped – my hand running lightly over the wallpaper. It felt normal, familiar, the dry grass-colored texture rough under my palm as my hand slid along the wall and past the line where the wallpaper abruptly ended, continuing on to the satin feel of the royal blue latex paint.

Paint that now covered the walls in this end of the hall. Paint that hadn't been there when I'd left for the work that morning.

'********'

_**EAMC POV**_

Isabella stood next to me, her breathing labored and her amber eyes glowing in the hallway light. Both of us had our palms resting against the wall at the end of the hall, both of us feeling the minute bumps and machined patterns in the wallpaper that hadn't been there a few hours earlier.

"He was there, you know."

She looked at me sharply, the intelligence in her gold eyes fiercer than ever.

"The boy?"

"He's not a boy any longer," I chuckled. "He's a handsome young man, who looks astonishingly like you… well, like his mother." And then it occurred to me that perhaps…

"You're not sorry, I mean, you don't have any regrets that…"

"What are you… oh god no, sweetheart, none at all!" She reached up and smoothed her thumbs over my cheeks. "Don't cast me in with Rosalie. I'm fine without propagating myself, at least not in the conventional manner." She turned away with a sly grin.

She'd been working on something for over a year now, consulting with Carlisle on occasion. For some reason she withheld information on it, insisting she wanted to surprise me and bring me in on it at precisely the right time. The only thing I knew for sure was, she wasn't getting pregnant. As unique as she might be, there were limits. Of course, I didn't delude myself. If anyone could find a way to get what she wanted, it was my wife. I cleared my throat, trying to keep my mind focused. Even after 15 years, just the thought of Isabella as my wife sent chills down my spine, and an excess flow of venom into my nether regions.

"Anyway," she continued, ignoring the way I shifted my legs as my trousers grew uncomfortable, "the real question is, how did this happen? The journal is long gone."

Her line of questioning was an excellent deflationary tactic, and I took the opportunity to focus. Unlike the times when we had the journal and I… slipped, I felt no side effects or physical distress – just some brief disorientation. This time it would appear the change was to our surroundings, not to me. And although that was a comfort, it also set off warning bells.

Something was very different, and looking at the wall, something was potentially very dangerous.

"What did you see when I…er… left?"

"You kinda winked out, and then you were here. I think if I'd been human, I might not have seen you leave at all."

"I was there longer than that, 47 seconds from my relative position." I brushed my hand along the wall again. "This is the wallpaper in their home; it was on the wall I pushed through."

Isabella once again ran her hand over the patch of wallpaper; her eyes with that familiar inward stare, the kind she always got when she was puzzling out a problem. She backed up, tapped her finger on her chin and started talking, as much to herself as to me.

"We have a few issues here. First, why now? After almost fifteen years, why are the universes connecting again? Second, why wasn't something like a journal necessary? And maybe most importantly, did sending that message in the accelerator directly result in this?"

Looking back on it, our actions seemed to make no sense. It was almost as if we were all caught up in some kind of bizarre game, all of us excited after hearing about Alice's vision of the boy. With no thought of consequences, we laughed and played at creating the intellectual puzzle that would be the code, crafted the tiny package to carry it, and immediately booked a flight for Switzerland, and CERN.

CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, was located near Geneva on the France/Swiss boarder. It was the home of the Large Hadron Collider – the most powerful accelerator ever built, spanning through underground tunnels below both countries.

For years, the entire family had been fascinated by developments in particle physics – this Hadron Collider in particular. We'd followed the design, the development, the construction, and the protests from groups fearing the worst of what might happen if humans successfully unlocked the secrets of the universe. But the point of our current endeavor was the game – nothing more. Few understood just how boring immortality could be, and when seemingly harmless fun presented itself, it was hard to resist turning a mind experiment into the real thing.

And so, we played – getting into the labs without detection, inserting the tiny block of lead foil into the accelerator… and then the rest of the time spent enjoying the Alps with Isabella. We were close, but not too close, to Italy. I felt confident we wouldn't be detected, and Alice gave no indication of problems.

"Did you know the Internet was created at CERN?" Isabella looked at me as if I had two heads, and to be honest, I had no idea where that thought came from. I stepped away, rubbing my face. My thoughts were normally far more ordered than that, and Isabella knew it. Blaming it on arousal didn't seem feasible.

I was about to come up with an excuse, something to explain that bizarre outburst of random information when my phone rang. Digging it out of my pocket, I saw it was Carlisle.

"Is there anything wrong?" It was rare for him to phone in the middle of the day, especially a day he was scheduled to be with patients.

"I just got a call from an old Italian friend. He's asking me what the hell we're up to – his words exactly."

"I don't understand, Carlisle."

"It appears there's something wrong in Volterra. He wouldn't explain any further, other than to say they're changing residences immediately. Edward, something is so wrong he fears for the safety of his wife, his friends… and Aro believes you had something to do with it."

"That's absurd, I mean…" I stared at the wall while I answered, the words drying up in my throat.

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**A/N Hi! Yes, I know, it took a while. But it's been snowing here. And icing. And I've been trapped in hotels near my office. And they make me work at work.**

**Unreasonable!**

**I hope you enjoy this, and I hope it won't take as long to get out the next. Questions, just ask! Review if you like, say hi if you like.**

**And it looks like Vampward is in trouble with the big boys. In honor of the recent Federal Mafia arrests, we need to give Aro a name like... Aro the Fish. Help me name him. The winner gets... uh... hmm. I have a bag of black dog fur, suitable for spinning into the finest wool... **

**At the very least, the winner will get their name into an A/N. Yeah I know. :-)  
**

**A wondrous thank you to Books for beta'ing, to Isa for pre-reading, and most of all to my dear friends who are now convinced I'm insane :-) **

**And once again, I have Douglas. He's being hand-fed grapes by scantily-clad chipmunks. I keep my squirrels happy.**

Where did I put my meds...


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

_**EAM POV**_

Warm, lightly scented skin surrounded me, the feel of a soft breast in my hand, the deep even breathing of a woman wrapped in my arms was the timepiece for my heart, beating slowly in time with the rhythm of the rise and fall of her chest. I felt a tightening in the pit of my stomach as I hardened against her, pushing gently against her satin skin. Here we were, in our mid-thirties, and her body still felt like a young woman's, my cock still hardening as often as a teenager's. Bella sighed, shifted her leg and reached back and grabbed my ass, inviting me, pushing me gently into her wetness, soft moans falling from her moist lips.

"Good morning, my love," I whispered into her shoulder, tasting the heat of her skin as her body woke, our hips moving slowly, my fingers playing with her hard nipple. She groaned and threw her head back, her hips moving faster, rotating against me and then suddenly I felt her tightening, my own orgasm ripping through me as I buried my lips in her hair, trying to be quiet.

Ed knew we weren't like normal parents, that the two of us fucked like rabbits at any opportunity in spite of how long we'd been together, and how old we supposedly were. We never talked about it, and although Bella and I tried to remain discreet, Ed was pretty insistent on moving up to the top floor as soon as he understood what the odd noises coming from his parents bedroom really were.

That is, until now. Right now, no one was sleeping on the top floor, and all of us were avoiding the end of the hallway. It's not as if we really expected something to happen, it's just we were… cautious. The vampire showed up with no warning, and I wasn't too happy about the idea he might do the same thing again. Maybe next time he'd take the floor with him instead of the wallpaper.

So now we're trying to be quiet because our son was on the same floor as us, 'cause fuck knows the two of us weren't ready to start curtailing sex. Ed started spending more time in the basement study. More often than not, Bella found him asleep on the couch down there.

I tried to feel bad about it, but as I drew Bella close to me - our breaths slowing as we both came down from our orgasms - I couldn't bring myself to. A healthy sex life between parents was a good example for children. That's what the books said, and who was I to argue?

"Dad?"

I groaned and rolled over, Bella giggling beside me as she stretched her arms over her head. I glanced down and admired her breasts, her nipples hardening as the cool air hit them. Just a few more min…

"Dad, get your lazy ass out of bed, I want to show you something."

"Coming!"

I growled as I rolled to the edge of the bed, trying to ignore the hard on that was making its reappearance. I stumbled towards the bathroom with one quick glance over my shoulder at Bella. She was cocooned in the quilt, her eyes drifting closed. Ignoring the temptation I opted for the shower. It was bad enough he could hear us, he didn't need to smell us, too.

Ed was in the kitchen, a magazine in front of him, huge mug of coffee in his hand. A break in the clouds sent a beam of light through the kitchen window, and I cringed when it illuminating his face. His skin was sallow, with dark circles under his eyes. His lips were drawn in a tight line and frankly, he looked like someone who had been used hard and put away wet – repeatedly.

It's been two weeks since the incident, and over our protests he took a leave from classes at the local college – although I couldn't argue with his logic when he insisted he learn more on his own than working with third-rate professors. Since then he'd literally lived in his room or the basement, surrounded by books. I lifted the magazine from the table and glanced at it. _Scientific American_, and the cover featured articles on ground-breaking research in particle physics.

I grabbed a mug and poured a cup of coffee, flopping down in the chair next to him.

"What's up?"

Not looking at me he started flipping pages until he came to the one he was looking for, and shoved it in front of me.

"It's an article on the research they've started at CERN. I'm not asking you to interpret the calculus, but look at the box on the bottom," he said, pointing to the bottom of the page. "They've actually published the objections from that group that's trying to stop the use of the collider."

I looked up at him, finally meeting his eyes. My son looked exhausted, his dark brown eyes bloodshot. "Summarize for me, what am I looking for specifically?" I asked, suppressing a yawn, my mind wandering back to the nymph snoring in my bedroom.

Ed rolled his eyes. "Focus, dad. Their objections have some valid scientific support." He stood and started pacing the kitchen. I leaned back, sipped my coffee, and tried to keep my attention on him while praying the upcoming lecture wasn't going to leave me feeling like an incompetent ass.

"First, Dad, there are Strangelets."

"What?"

"Strangelets. It's a theoretical form of matter, more stable than normal matter, that might be formed by accelerating two lead atoms towards each other. If they exist in nature, it's assumed they'd dissipate and ignore Earth. But, if they were created _on_ Earth they might be trapped in the Earth's gravitational field, and might interact with miniature black holes.

"Black holes…?"

"Exactly. Now, it's also assumed the LHC…"

"LHC?"

Ed sighed. "Large Hadron Collider. Focus, Dad. It might create miniature black holes, but they're considered by most scientists to be harmless, and would eventually dissipate following the rules of Hawking Radiation. They theorize that miniature black holes are created all the time by cosmic rays. But again, what would happen if one was created but trapped within Earth's gravitational field? Would it grow larger instead of evaporating?"

"Ed, are you trying to tell me we have a black hole on the third floor of our house?"

He stopped, chewed his lip and then shook his head. "Not really. Look, these are the concerns that The Citizens Against the Large Hadron Collider have published, with some impressive scientific names behind them. But as expected, they've been ignored.

"But let's take another leap, and examine the unexpected. A large quantity of lead actually gets _into_ the Collider, creating far more Strangelets than they'd have ever envisioned because no one ever expected a large lump of lead to make its way in there. And what if this new, theoretical form of matter interacted with a miniature black hole?"

I stared at him. "Where's that message from… that guy? The one wrapped in lead."

"In my desk drawer, upstairs."

None of us had gone to the third floor since the… incident, except to grab clothes and books Ed needed. We didn't talk about it, we simply moved him down to the guest bedroom.

I was no slouch, but my son was a genius. Even so, something didn't make sense.

"Ed, we're in parallel worlds. Why didn't the vampire know this? Why would he risk it?" From the little I knew of him, he was brilliant. In fact, I had my suspicion that's where our son got his brains, but thinking of the implications of how that could have happened made my heard hurt.

Ed sat quietly, looking down at the magazine. "I don't… well what if this hadn't been discovered over there?"

"What?"

"I mean, what if the wrong person died at the wrong time, or had an accident? I mean, we do know there are minor differences aside from the whole vampire shit. What if the analogue to the person here who discovered this about Strangelets and black holes died over there too soon?"

It made sense. It also meant there might be more substantial differences between our two worlds than I had considered. I mean, what the hell did I really know about their world? Yeah, there was an Edward who was my doppelganger, there were identical schoolyards, but he was born in 1901 – and I wasn't. I hadn't really thought of that before. What else might be different?

"I'm going upstairs to get the message, Dad. Want to come with me?"

I nodded and slowly rose to my feet, trying to rub away the headache that started every time I tried to puzzle out how our parallel universes existed. Two weeks of trying to ignore it, but the fact this vampire popped in and disappeared with some of our wall, leaving me with some of his, wasn't going away. If Ed had an idea what caused it, I'd go along for the ride and try to offer what little I could. I was merely a doctor, he was the brilliant young man who used to be a star student at MIT.

Grateful Bella was still asleep, we moved up the stairs, treading slowly as if we expected a monster to jump out at us, looking around corners, watching our feet and the floor. Finally we got to the top floor, carefully walking towards his room… and I couldn't help it. I looked up at the end of the hall, where the wallpaper disappeared… and sagged against the closed door of his room, sliding down to the floor, and started banging my head back against the solid wood.

Ed stopped, looking down at me in disbelief. "Dad, what the hell's wrong with you?"

I couldn't stay a word; I could only raise my shaking hand and point at the wall.

Written on the blue paint, in broad black strokes, in a handwriting that looked like mine but I knew wasn't, was…

_**Volterra, Italy**_

'**********'**

_**EAMC POV**_

The citizens of the walled city of Volterra were proud of the castle that rose above the ancient stone walls that surrounded their town. It was a tourist destination, bringing much-needed funds to their coffers, and the presence of such a devout sect of monks gave the good people a sense of safety that their afterlife was well protected. One starts farther up the rungs of Heaven if one lives in the company of the spiritual.

Isabella and I stood in the square. It was early evening, the sun was safely tucked away and out of sight. We stared at the ancient castle, knowing who the townsfolk thought were in there, knowing what really inhabited those walls.

The exterior of the building was weathered and covered in lichen, the small windows braced with peeling shutters and no glass. To all appearances, there had been no change since the castle was built in the late 12th century. The monks eschewed the use of glass, bowing to tradition as they huddled in front of their fires in their woolen robes.

Or so the humans thought.

Grabbing the tarnished brass handle I opened the oak door and nodded for Isabella to walk behind me, rather than in front as a gentleman would insist. But I had no idea what I'd find on the other side of the door, least of all the silence that greeted me. Our cautious footfalls echoed through the winding corridors and twisted spaces, the scent of unwashed human bodies permeating the air.

"It was quite impressive at one time."

Isabella and I both whirled around at the sound of the voice, shocked that neither of us had detected the vampire standing behind us. Shaking his head and chuckling softly, he removed his battered woolen cloak, the source of the fetid human scent, folding it carefully and draping it over his arm.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Edward." He nodded, bowing just enough to offer greeting while making it crystal clear it was not a subservient gesture. Turning to Isabella he offered his hand, appearing to simply want to offer a respectful greeting. Isabella ignored the gesture – she'd been properly warned by us all.

His eyes narrowed before he recovered from the slight. "And you are… ?"

Isabella gave him a brilliant smile, all flashing eyes and teeth. "Isabella Cullen, and from the painting in Carlisle's home, I can see you're Aro." She bowed from the waist – not too deeply, just enough to show respect for his years without appearing to accede to his authority.

"Yes, well…" he mumbled, taken aback both by her youth coupled with the demeanor of years she clearly didn't have.

"This is my wife, Aro," I soft softly. "My mate."

Hands fluttering as he reached for me to offer a handshake, once again clearly annoyed when my hand stayed at my side, he recovered with a huge smile plastered on his ancient face. "Ah yes, my congratulations to you both." He cleared his throat, and waved to the hallway behind us.

"Excuse my manners. I summoned you here for a reason." He strode forward between Isabella and me, intending to push us aside and appear to graze our arms accidentally as he slid between us. We both stepped aside quickly and out of his reach, leaving a path between us and a rather annoyed vampire striding down the corridor, not looking back, expecting we should follow. I grabbed Isabella's hand, lifted it to my lips for a kiss and a sweet taste of her skin, rolling my eyes and trying to suppress the automatic lower body reaction to nothing more than a mere hint of her on my tongue. We followed Aro, while Isabella barely repressed her snort of laughter. What can I say, we're newlyweds – of a sort.

The three of us walked quietly through the castle, the smell of dust and mold mixing with the damp cold stone walls all around us. Carlisle had briefed us before our departure. The Volturi had lived in this castle since it was built, and with a little help from the Vatican – the only humans who knew vampires existed – those who lived in the surrounding city believed it was inhabited by a cloistered order of Monks, living their lives in prayer.

Vampires didn't feel the heat or cold, nor were we affected by the dampness of the old building. It was no hardship for them to use this ancient and imposing structure as their seat of power, hiding in "religious penance" during the day and only venturing out at night.

"I'm certain Carlisle explained the ruse," he said from in front of us, not bothering to turn when speaking. He spoke in deeply accented English, although it was clear his native tongue wasn't Italian. I could quite place it, but suspected it might be a form of Spanish.

"It's been decades since your 'father,'" he drew air quotes in the air, "graced us with his presence. These days we have a few old and battered Volvo vans that we use for leaving this walled city." He chuckled while I stared at the back of his head. "Far less odiferous than offal-filled carts and horses, while still allowing us to look the part of poor souls who have taken a vow of poverty. Twenty-five kilometers outside the city is a farm house, and the barn houses the vehicles more appropriate to our station."

I knew the Volturi were wealthy beyond description, and knew they considered themselves to be royalty. I had wondered why they put up with the meager trappings of monks, and how they managed to still flaunt their wealth.

"Normally we move back and forth between the farm and this edifice. Right now we're living there, and have been for a week or two. I will not allow my mate to be in any danger." We had climbed three flights of stone stairs set into curved walls, and were now walking down a dark and windowless corridor towards a set of rusted iron doors.

Aro paused before the doors, listening carefully before grabbing the rusted iron handles, and with a groaning protest of hinges, pulled them open, gesturing for us to follow him inside.

In the center of the round, cavernous room were three chairs – ornate and designed to look like golden thrones. Perhaps they really were gold, but that's not where he led us. He walked towards the wall opposite the door, so deep in shadows even our enhanced eyesight had difficulty piercing through the gloom.

"This room is generally used to… exact justice," he said with a sniff. "It has the right ambiance, wouldn't you say?" Neither Isabella nor I responded, nor did I think he really expected an answer.

There was the sound of a match striking, followed by the familiar smell of sulfur. Aro lit a wax taper in a candelabra on the wall, and why we were there became immediately apparent.

Still holding Isabella's hand I walked over to the wall, light pulsing across it in the flickering candlelight. I stared at it, willing myself not to laugh at the absurdity of what I was seeing. It went from the floor to over 7 feet high, and approximately 15 feet in width.

Ignoring Aro, I whispered to Isabella. "At least our human had better taste than this."

She knew precisely what I meant, both of us staring at the plasterboard walls where once had stood solid stone. Large fluorescent orange flowers were painted on the wall, reminiscent of the worst of the flower power era of the 1960's and 70's, complete with a peace sign drawn on the right, just before the wall ended and returned to stone. Aro sniffed again, glaring at the symbol once popularly used for peace on earth. I'm certain he had no interest in any end of conflict on this planet. Conflict gave human blood drinkers the opportunity to indulge without suspicion.

But then my eye wandered, and widened, as I saw why he'd evacuated the castle. Six feet to the right of where the plasterboard ended there was a jagged line through the wall running from floor to the turret ceiling 50 feet above our heads. The three-foot-thick broken wall had separated, faint moonlight seeping through the separation.

Aro walked over to it and ran his hand over the crack. "There's more like this in other parts of the structure, although this is the only place where we now have a hippie decoration as well. Disgusting era," he muttered. Turning to me, he took a few steps, eyes narrowing as he approached me.

"So, what in the name of Hades have you been up to, Edward?" he hissed.

Instinctively, I grabbed Isabelle and took a step back, his blood-red eyes glaring, his ancient, blackened lips curling back, exposing his yellowed teeth.

Pulling myself to my full height, I towered over the old vampire. "Aro, I don't understand..."

"Don't play me for a fool, boy," he growled. "And where is the journal?"

* * *

**A/N Hi! Yes, I know, it's been almost two weeks. But it's been snowing here. And icing. And I've been trapped in hotels near my office. And they make me work at work.**

**Unreasonable!**

**And that's exactly what I wrote last chapter! Lather, rinse, repeat. It's all true!  
**

**I hope you enjoy this. Questions, just ask! Review if you like, say hi if you like.**

**A wondrous thank you to Booksgalore/Bookishqua for beta'ing in record time, and to Isa for pre-reading.**

**Douglas has impregnated one of the scantily-clad chipmunks. He's currently being held for cross-species propagation and is being sued for squirrel/chipmunk hybrid support.**

**Thank you all for your "name the Aro" suggestions.**** and the prize goes to... bugsmama07! "Aro the Fang." I love it! Gotta work it into the story.**

**What, you say he has no fangs? This is true, but it's not what he tells da boys...**

**Just a quick note at the end. All the scientific stuff Ed, Jr. has spouted is real. The Large Hadron Collider is real. The objections to it are real - including the name of the group protesting against its use.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: Yeah well, we all know the drill. However, this plot, as bizarre as it is, is mine.**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

_**EAM POV**_

I'd have thought the American Consulate would have been ornate, filled with gold leaf and delicate antique furniture and paintings of lush women with bare tits. I mean, we were in Italy, right?

Instead, after an endless ride in the back of a locked van, the afternoon sun pounding through the windows - heating the airless box like an oven - we finally pulled off the E35 and headed into Rome. Our momentary excitement at being in this cradle of civilization was squashed as we were driven to the back of an outrageously ornate building, pulled out of the van, and unceremoniously shoved through a featureless gray door.

And now we - and by 'we' I mean Ed, Bella and myself - found ourselves in a stark steel room that appeared to be very much like the one Ed described at the NSA – complete with a simmering Aro.

But I should start at the beginning.

Volterra was a disaster. We stopped outside the towering, lichen covered city walls, leaving the rental car under the dubious shade of an olive tree, and headed towards an arched gate packed with swarms of people screaming and pushing their way out. Above the ancient walls the sky was masked by clouds of dust hanging in the air, and for a moment I was reminded of televised scenes of New York City and the fog of debris from the World Trade Center.

The three of us fought our way to the gate, holding hands to keep from being separated by the panicked crowds. Pushing against the tide, we kept close together as we got through the arch and within the city walls, fighting for every inch, pressed against the rough stone buildings to keep from being crushed, as we headed towards the center of the city and the fountain so beautifully pictured in the tourist brochures.

But the fountain was no longer beautiful. Water sprayed haphazardly around chunks of rock and the heads and arms of decapitated statues, rivulets of water running down their cheeks and through their fingers like so many tears. Behind the fountain were the smoldering remains of glittering marble and raw granite, piled and spewing dust and pulsating sprays of water from the burst water pipes buried in the ton of wreckage.

There were no words, nothing could express our shock and horror as we took in the carnage around us. Flames leapt from between the tons of piled rock that had once been the castle. Postcards littered the ground, skittering and tumbling in breaths of air and fluttered against our ankles. Vendor's carts were overturned, the smell of sausage and roasted peppers mixing with the choking scent of burned hair and clothes and skin. Deserted, the suffocating silence of Volterra was broken only by the crackling fire and the splashing of water as it echoed through the square and into the deserted alleys branching off from the center piazza.

"Mom, Dad, could you come here a moment?" We'd been so caught up in the shock of what was before us, neither Bella nor I had realized Ed had wandered off, and was calling to us from the far side of what might have once been a pleasant outdoor café.

I grabbed Bella's hand and we stumbled together, wincing as she tried to walk over the rubble in her thin-soled sandals. Rounding the corner the wind shifted, blowing the smoke directly at us.

I pulled the collar of my t-shirt up and covered my nose and mouth. "Bella," I mumbled through the cloth, getting her attention so she could see what I was doing. She quickly unknotted her scarf and wrapped it around her face, her small body shaking as she tried to cough out the smoke that seeped into her lungs. To get to Ed we had to walk through the blinding smoke, finding paths over endless piles of stone and paper and the occasional pieces of statuary and furniture and the wreckage of centuries and the debris of the lives of…

"Stop," I whispered, looking around me. "Bella," I said hesitantly, "there's the possibility we might find bodies…"

"Yes, I know," she interrupted me, her eyes pained above the scarf draping across the bridge of her nose. I nodded, twisted my fingers in hers and continued on.

My eyes stung as we walked, the yellow dust swirling around us, seeming alive when it pulsated with the smallest shift of wind as we picked our way through the plaza. Fire crackled, exploding into the occasional roar as something highly flammable succumbed to the heat and flames. Water sprayed and sizzled on the rocks, enough water to add clouds of steam to the acrid smoke but not enough to extinguish the fire. We walked, eyes blinded by tears and smoke with time standing still, trapped in our own hell on earth but we had to continue on, get through it, out of it, get to Ed. Sounds crept in, inhuman sounds echoing through the smoke, sounds that reminded me of the wails of children and the giggles of the insane. I held Bella's hand tighter, stumbling, tears drenching my cheeks as much from my growing fear as from the smoke.

The wails grew louder, the giggles turned to breathy moans and just as I was sure I was going fucking mad the smoke suddenly cleared. Turning, I looked where we had come from – at the swirling dense smoke and… heard nothing but silence – not the hell I thought we'd just visited. I shook my head. I'd been disoriented, that's all. There had been nothing alive in that smoke with us. Nothing could have lived in that smoke…

"Mom? Dad?"

Ed was only a few yards in front of us, his brown eyes large, his forehead creased, his mouth set. He was hunkered down and staring at something behind the remnants' of a wall. Looking up, he waved us over.

Bella gasped when we approached, and just as quickly schooled her expression into something neutral, taking deep breaths, getting herself under control. I closed my eyes briefly, and then dared to look at what was in front of us.

Ed was kneeling in front of the body of a young woman dressed in light summer clothes, the lemon yellow of her linen shirt covered in smudges of mud, dotted with small holes where burning ashes had landed. She had once been pretty, olive skin and thick dark hair, her dark eyes wide and lifeless in death and her mouth frozen into a silent scream. The lower half of her body was buried under part of a wall, and although it was clear she was long dead the doctor in me had to make sure. I moved around Ed and reached for her neck to check her pulse. And that was when I saw it.

Her neck was ripped open, the white of cartilage and tendons peeked through the ravaged red muscle and the flaps of torn skin. I looked around, wondering what could have caused this type of wound. Flying wood? Exploding pipes? What would have ripped her throat out as the wall buried her legs?

"Dad," Ed whispered, as if the demons of hell lurking in the swirling smoke might overhear us. "Dad, what's missing?"

My eyes shot to his. "What are you talking about? What do you mean 'missing'?"

"Just… I don't… " Ed stumbled over his words, and pointed to her neck. I followed with my eyes, trying to see what he was talking about.

Aside from the obvious damage to her neck, there was nothing else to see, just what was once the soft olive skin of this young Italian girl. The only thing remotely different from the rest of her was the fact her neck was clean, unlike her face, or clothes, or…

_Fuck_

"There's no blood."

Ed nodded in agreement as my eyes roamed over the wound, her hair, her face, her clothes. The wound should have bled profusely; she should have been lying in a pool of blood. Her carotid artery was severed, blood should have sprayed all over her, the stones - everything. But in spite of having her throat torn out, leaving a gaping wound so large I could have put my fist into it, the one thing there was no evidence of was a single drop of blood.

And that's when, out of nowhere, in the ruined and abandoned square in the heart of Volterra, they grabbed us.

'**********'

_**EAMC POV**_

"I burned it."

Aro's eyes narrowed as his attention turned from me to Isabella.

"Excuse me?"

"I said I burned the journal."

"How, how could you burn a priceless artifact?" Aro sputtered in anger, his hands clenching as he took a step towards my wife. Isabella caught my eyes with a look that took me years to learn, but I finally figured out that particular expression meant, 'Don't go all heroic caveman on me, I've got it.' Regardless, it took all of my self control not to put myself in front of Isabella, shielding her from this ancient vampire.

Isabella narrowed her own eyes and tossed her hair. "It was before I was turned, and if the circumstances were the same today, I'd do it again."

"Idiot! Do realize how valuable it was?"

"Of course I do. But the value of Edward's life outweighed anything else. He was a victim of the journal, caught between the universes, neither fully human nor fully vampire when a nomad chose that moment to try to destroy him." She stopped, a calculating look on her face. "He was the kind of nomad who was bound to make a name for himself – he kidnapped and murdered my father, who happened to have been the chief of police. Just the sort of character _you and your friends_ were supposed to keep under wraps before he made our existence obvious to the humans." She glared at him. "And so I did what I had to. _Where were you?"_

Aro took another step forward. "You, you're a child, what would you know of what I have done over the centuries to protect our kind? The loss of an immortal would have been worth the salvation of that journal."

"_You bastard,"_ she hissed, walking away from Aro and to my side, taking my hand in hers. "The life of my husband was worth more than that foolish book. You and your cohorts, what right do you have to take the moral high ground? If you'd bothered to come out of your ivory tower on occasion, you'd have found your word and your laws were empty. Three of them travelled together, all three nomads taking humans indiscriminately. If I hadn't burned the journal, if Edward hadn't regained his full strength so he could stop them, those three insane vampires would have continued what they were doing, wreaking havoc through the Americas." Isabella was getting worked up, and she was magnificent when she was angry. I started to wonder how long we had to endure this bore before we could find a secluded… anywhere. Right now I'd take her in a closet. If she agreed, of course.

Aro's nostrils flared while he drew himself to his full height, and I readied myself for the possibility of physical violence. Instead, he spun on his heel and stalked back to the cracked wall. He stared at it, his jaw clenching as he worked at controlling his temper.

"What's done is done," he mumbled at the wall. "However, the loss of this precious artifact does little to explain what happened."

I turned to Isabella and questioned her with my eyes. She shrugged her shoulders and nodded.

"This isn't the only odd occurrence," I offered. Aro turned to me, his eyebrow raised.

"Explain."

"There's a similar disturbance on the top floor of our house. No true damage, but there seems to have been an exchange of wall covering after I…"

His eyes narrowed. "After you what?"

I took a deep breath. "After I briefly found myself in the other universe. Through no effort of my own," I added quickly. "I was simply walking in my home and suddenly I was… there. His son, my doppelganger's son, I mean, saw me. And just as abruptly I returned to my own home." I looked at Isabella, who nodded for me to continue. "I felt no ill effects, but the wall covering in part of the hallway was different. A section of the wall now had the wallpaper that had been there – very much like what you see here." I gestured at the grotesque flowered wall covering where the castle stone had been.

Aro turned away and paced through the large chamber. Isabella fit herself into my side, my arm wrapping around her shoulders while I kissed the top of her head, both of us watching him warily. Aro started muttering to himself.

"The journal is destroyed yet the universes are connected?" he mumbled. "Impossible, unless there's another way…" He spun and faced me. "Have you found another way to communicate? Have you been attempting to reach him again?"

I closed my eyes and cursed silently. Could what we'd done be the cause behind this? But why didn't Alice see it might cause a problem? And how do I explain my behavior to Aro without revealing how much we all counted on Alice's prescience without disclosing her particular talent?

What I hadn't counted on was my Isabella.

"Aro, we managed to get to the Collider at CERN, theorizing it might be possible to transfer a message to the other universe during a routine experiment, without the local physicists realizing we had tampered with their device." Sometimes the simple truth is best. I pulled her closer to me and kissed the top of her head, her fragrance filling my nose. _Focus Edward._

Aro tapped his chin with an overly manicured finger. All evidence of anger was gone – his legendary curiosity taking over. "Did it work?"

I shrugged. "We managed to sneak in a second time to check. It disappeared, so I assume it must have."

Aro started pacing again. "Is it possible? Did you create some kind of breach when you moved a physical object through?" Suddenly he stopped, his mouth forming a sly grin. "This may be just what I need to finally convince him to become one of us."

Had I heard correctly? He'd been trying to convince a human to become a vampire? Aro, so renowned for his contempt for all things human that just the idea he'd specifically singled one for anything but his dinner was absurd. I reached into his mind, and found his thoughts efficiently blocked. He grinned at me, enjoying my frustration.

"Who are you talking about?"

Aro's ancient eyes gleamed in triumph. "Can you imagine what he could offer me if he was both healthy and immortal?"

"Aro, who are you talking about?" I repeated, trying to hide the irritation in my voice.

He walked over and grabbed my elbow, dragging me towards the door. "Let's get out of here. We can take my private jet to the British Isles." I pulled out of his grasp and backed away, pulling Isabella with me.

"For the last time, Aro, who are you talking about?"

"Why young man, I think I may finally found what I've needed to convince Stephen Hawking to join us."

* * *

**A/N **

**First, before I forget (and I will) if you want to learn more about the incredible Stephen Hawking, a bio of his life and work can be found at:**

**http : / www . notablebiographies . com / Gi-He / Hawking-Stephen . html**

**Second, I'd like to thank Booksgalore/Bookishqua for dropping everything to beta this, cause when I finish a chapter I'm inclined to jump up and down, insisting I need to post it asap. Yeah I know, I should act my age.**

**And third, I hope you enjoy it. Let me know, if you like. Maybe no lemons in this chapter but, if Vampward could find a broom closet in the castle you know he'd be busy. Maybe he'll join the mile-high club...  
**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

_**EAM POV**_

"Déjà vu all over again," Ed mumbled. Bella clasped a hand over her mouth, trying to stifle her laughter, given the seriousness of our situation. She'd have an easier time if my own lips weren't twitching.

"There's nothing even remotely amusing about this," Aro growled, sucking all the humor out of the room. "And if I remember correctly," he fumed, glaring at Ed, "you were to remain in contact with me, giving me detailed reports of any progress you've made." He huffed and sat back, folding his short arms across his skinny chest. "Instead, I find the three of you in the middle of Volterra."

It had only been a few weeks since Aro showed up at our home with Ed, full of European manners, and clothes, and an air of bored superiority so well-crafted that if I didn't know better, I'd think it took centuries to perfect. This was not the Aro facing us across the steel table.

His hair was frizzy and unkempt, pieces of it straying from the gold clasp he wore at the back of his neck. His olive skin was sallow - almost green-tinged - with dark purple bruises covering hefty bags beneath his eyes. His saffron-colored lips twitched in time with a tick in the corner of his eye. The doctor in me feared a stroke or heart attack. The man in me could care less.

Seated next to Aro was a character who could have stepped out of the pages of a comic book. His unlined face gave the impression of youth, but his hair was pure white. Just like Aro his hair was long, but instead of restraining it, he let it float around his shoulders, making him more pretty than handsome. Ebony eyes stared at us, narrowed, calculating, with a glitter of cruelty that punched at my gut. Instinct kicked in as I reached my arm out and wrapped it around Bella's shoulders, wishing Ed wasn't as far away as he was – wishing he'd see my concern and move closer to me, to allow me to fill the role of father and husband and protector- even if it was the other way around.

Rapid maturity wasn't the only "difference" Ed had to contend with. There was no question in my mind he perceived the same threat I did, and was giving himself space - calculating speed and distance. We both knew who the protector truly was in our little family unit.

To the left of the white-haired man was another, an older man although he had the lush, thick black hair of youth. His face was haggard, but not with stress, like Aro's. His mouth was lax, his eyes roamed the room – not vacant, but disinterested – as if his mind was trapped somewhere else with just the vestiges of enough curiosity left to allow awareness of his surroundings.

Aro watched us examining the other men, and cleared his throat. "Excuse my manners," he said, pointing to the white-haired man. "My brother, Caius, and," leaning past him to point out the older man, "My other brother, Marcus."

Caius turned his attention to Bella. "It's a pleasure to meet a beautiful woman," he cooed, ignoring Ed and I, his voice and manner oozing pomade and sexual innuendo. Bella responded by wrapping her arm around my waist, snuggling closer to my side. Aro rolled his eyes as if he'd witnessed this very scene one too many times. Ignoring his brother, he scrubbed his hands over his face before placing them on the table, folding them in front of him in an unsuccessful attempt to hide his trembling. Clearing his throat again, he lowered his brow, eyes darting between the three of us.

"Marcus and Caius have both seen the journal; have communicated with their… twins." He looked down at the table, sighed, lifted his head and glared at me.

"Consider yourself fortunate, the effects on you were relatively temporary – aside from your slowed aging. Caius' hair wasn't always white and Marcus…" his words dropped to a whisper. "Marcus' doppelganger was not quite right in the head. Whatever brand of mental illness he had affected my brother. Even after the journal disappeared, his mental faculties never fully recovered. He's not incompetent. He simply ceases to care – as best I can tell."

Well, this was unexpected. "When did you have it? I mean, when did you have the journal?

"Caius found it on the rim of the fountain in Volterra in 1952, just sitting there, ignored by everyone in the piazza, almost as if they couldn't see it. As he tells it…"

"I can speak for myself," Caius interrupted with a sneer. Aro raised his hands in a gesture of peace and leaned back, folding his hands across his belly. His posture was one of someone relaxed and in charge, but the knuckles on his folded hands were white with tension.

"The artifact was interesting," he said, his voice low and cold and sending a shiver down my spine. Bella burrowed into my side.

"It didn't appear to belong to anyone, or perhaps if it did I simply didn't care. I took it, and my experience with it was perhaps not a great deal different from your own. Through it I learned of the other universe, the existence of vampires in that universe, and, like you, learned our doppelgangers," shifting his eyes to Aro and Marcus, "were vampires as well."

He winked at Bella, and I felt a soft hand on my thigh restraining me. "Fascinating development, wouldn't you say?" he asked, a smile slowly widening his thin-lipped mouth. "What are the chances of coincidence? You find the journal, and your doppelganger is a vampire. I find the journal, and once again, our brothers are vampires as well. It would appear fate might play a hand." He leered at Bella. "I was just starting to experiment with the… nuances of human blood when the journal… disappeared."

His eyes narrowed even more, and his olive complexion flushed. He took a deep, calming breath, and fixed his gaze on me. "And I would like to have it returned."

"Yes well, so would I," Aro interrupted, waving his hand with a flourish, ignoring his brother's building rage. "The two of you spent an inordinate amount of time with it. Perhaps if you'd chosen to share a bit more Marcus wouldn't be quite the vegetable he is today."

Marcus turned his head and glared at Aro, obviously aware enough to hear what was said about him. Aro inclined his head. "Sorry dear brother, go back to whatever deep thoughts keep you preoccupied." He turned back to us.

"As Caius said, it was suddenly gone, showing up on the Olympic Peninsula 15 years ago. And now, to the best of our knowledge, it's gone again."

Now that Aro had dropped his façade of interest for the sake of governments and history and precious artifacts, the three of them now seemed more like Mafia gangsters from a Grade B movie. But one fact was clear – Caius was a dangerous man, and I needed to divert attention from my wife and son.

"Aro, what's happening in Volterra has nothing to do with the journal. It has nothing to do with us." I nodded to Ed and stood, grabbing Bella's hand.

"Then why were you there?"

_Shit_. Good question. I was just trying to come up with a decent lie when Ed spoke up.

"Because we were given a message." I started at Ed's voice, and opened my mouth to deny anything he said.

"There's no point lying, Dad. What ever's happening here goes beyond us and these three stooges." Caius rose with a shout that turned into a grunt when Aro shot a hand out and grabbed his arm, pulling him back into his chair with a thud.

"If Edward, I mean the vampire Edward," Ed continued, "managed to get a message to us without the aid of the journal, and then managed to scrawl, "Volterra, Italy" on the wall of our house, it seems that in doing so the separation between our universes has been damaged in some way."

He turned to Aro. "I assume you saw the bloodless bodies in Volterra, too. Am I right?"

Aro nodded. "Thus far the body count is 27, not counting those crushed by the collapse of the castle. The American CIA has been brought in, along with MI5 from the United Kingdom. We, and they, believe we can contain this particular disaster and tamper with the evidence so it appears they bled to death."

Aro rose, extending his hands in a gesture of friendship. My bullshit meter just went off the scale.

"Let's call a truce, shall we? Vampires are here, in this universe. At the moment the only knowledge we have of them is whatever has been communicated, via the journal, over the centuries. The Vatican is sorting through everything they have in their archives, and we've been invited to attend a meeting at the Pentagon next week. Representatives of various world governments will be there to discuss our options. I'd like to ask the three of you to join us – add what little you can"

"How," I asked. "I mean, the castle in Volterra just collapsed. How do so many know about it? It just happened."

Aro looked around the room, and I suddenly noticed the noises outside our door - the mumbling of television newscasters, the hushed voices, the clicking of heels on tile floors.

He leaned forward, no more than a foot away from my face, and whispered, "Because it's not the only site. The Forbidden City in China was destroyed last evening, and we believe the Chinese government is covering up the deaths of far more than the 27 drained bodies we have here.

'**********'

_**EAMC POV**_

"Stephen, it's time to stop dancing around the issue."

We were in an office at the University of Cambridge, and Aro was doing something I didn't think I'd ever see, even if I lived until the stars faded from the sky. Aro was on his knees in front of Dr. Stephen Hawking, his hands clasped in front of him, looking for all the world as if he was praying.

"Aro, I haven't struggled to stay alive this long just to allow you to kill me."

I knew what to expect. The technology to allow Dr Hawking to talk was extraordinary, and based on subtle movements of the skin below his eye. There was a time when the voice simulator responded to his finger, but as time went on the neurological disease took that movement as well. Now, the only thing he could move was this small piece of skin. When that stopped functioning, the only hope was a direct brain hookup to the computer – and no one was anxious to intrude upon this genius' brain.

Isabella stood off to the side, studying him in a way that should embarrass him, but I will grant that perhaps at this point in his life he was accustomed to it. The poor man was twisted in his wheelchair, a prisoner of his body, his mind active and normal and… trapped. He was the epitome of courage.

"Stephen, we need you. This is not the time to put your wishes before mine." Aro was still on his knees, but true to his nature his request was more a demand. Perhaps he thought Isabella and I would join forces in pushing him. Then again, I will allow that perhaps Aro did have some respect for him – it wasn't as if he couldn't just take him if he wished. With a mind such as Hawking had, gaining his cooperation would be a boon. And I had a suspicion he'd be a formidable newborn.

And that's when it occurred to me… If Dr Hawking didn't agree to be changed, and the worst happened and his disease continued to degenerate his body, I could offer my services – reaching into his mind to relay his thoughts. I wondered if Isabella might consider a move to Cambridge. It's been years, but I did enjoy my time here in the 50's.

There was a stir to my side, and Isabella moved from her corner and sat in a chair, facing Dr Hawking.

"What makes you assume we're dead?"

Aro stood and brushed off his knees. "Young woman, don't speak about what you know not."

Isabella turned slowly from Dr Hawking to Aro, and I knew my wife well enough to know she was masking contempt. This was a dangerous game to play with Aro. She cleared her throat, perhaps for the benefit of Hawking more than Aro and I, since both of us knew how unnecessary it was.

"Aro, there are few with as many millennium of wisdom as you," she said softly and respectfully, barely masking the subtle dig at his age. "But I suspect you, all of you, have begun to believe the legend more than the facts."

She turned to me. "Edward, sweetheart, it's inevitable that you would believe it as well. Relative to your age, or Aro's, or Carlisle's, advances in the understanding of biology are new – in spite of your multiple medical degrees."

I raised my eyebrow, both fascinated with where she was leading this conversation, and wondering if this is what she'd been working on with Carlisle these past years.

"Yes," she said, answering my unspoken question. "This is what I've been studying with Carlisle, and although he has the education I don't have sometimes it's helpful to have someone come along to think outside the box." She grinned. "Like me."

She turned back to Dr Hawking. "Sir, the concept of undead is that of mythology, not of fact."

"Your name is Isabella?" he asked, the mechanical monotone voice speaking slowly.

She inclined her head. "Yes, although you can call me Bella if you like," she smiled. Her eyes darted between Aro and myself before she spoke again. "I chose to take this evolutionary step 15 years ago, and I've yet to regret it."

"Young lady, if you would return to the corner where you were so pleasantly quiet before, I'd like to continue my conversation with Dr Hawking, without suffering from both your insults and your fantasies." Aro sneered at her.

I could feel the growl starting deep within my chest, but before I could move the mechanical voice stopped me.

"Aro, stop being an ass. I would like to hear what Isabella… Bella, has to say."

She inclined her head to the doctor, thoroughly ignoring Aro. "Dr Hawking, we are not dead, nor are we raised from the dead. As a matter of fact, if we're not still alive when infected with the changing element, nothing happens. The dead remain dead."

She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, all of her attention focused on the twisted shell of this brilliant man in front of her. "With the help of Dr Cullen I've been studying precisely what we are for the past decade, and the only conclusion I can draw is, we are an evolutionary leap.

"Humans are changed not by killing them, with some mysterious process bringing them back to life. We're changed by the direct injection of the fluids we carry in our bodies. This fluid, called venom by vampires, is actually comprised of two components. One is similar to snake venom, causing partial paralysis in the victim, making it easier for the vampire to feed with minimal noise from their food source. In the normal process, the vampire drains all the blood from the human, the human dies – and unlike the movies and books, stays dead.

"But, on occasion, the vampire has the strength to over-ride instinct and stop feeding before all of the blood is drained, leaving the victim alive. When that happens, the second component takes over – the parasitic virus."

"Isabella," I whispered, "Carlisle confirmed this?"

She nodded. "It never occurred to him to even look before. The virus itself is far smaller than the norm. It required an electron microscope to detect it."

She turned back to Hawking. "The virus is fast-acting, and fully takes over the body of the host – transforming it into an environment it can survive in – so it can reproduce itself by infecting others.

"The host's DNA is permanently altered by the virus. Normal viruses do that to specific cells before the human immune system can sense the intruder and destroy it. This virus works so quickly the body has no time to mount a defense. The normal human digestive system is altered so nutrition is absorbed from the stomach, to the small intestine, directly to the bloodstream, making the large intestine useless. Muscle tissue is enhanced, as well as the neural network of both the body and the brain. In a human, the large muscles of the legs aid the heart in returning blood from the lower extremities. In a vampire, the larger muscles, because of how powerful they now are, take over for the heart – rendering it useless. Therefore, we have no heart beat – but are just as alive as a human whose heart was removed and replaced with an external pump.

"And the immortality?" asked the monotone voice.

Isabella shrugged. "Perhaps we are, perhaps we're not. I do know the altered cells are impervious to disease and aging caused by DNA degeneration. Our nutritional needs are blood – not unlike a number of other mammals. Instinctively, human blood calls to us because it's the perfect nutritional balance for our bodies, but it's not a requirement. Carlisle Cullen, a vampire you haven't met, determined a few centuries ago that large animal blood was an adequate substitute.

"In other words," Isabella turned to Aro, "if we can control the instinctive drive to consume the blood of the humans around us, our diet isn't a whole lot different from the diet of humans. Instead of consuming the animal's flesh and muscle, we consume its blood." She turned back to Dr Hawking. "Nothing supernatural or even unnatural about it."

"But Aro once told me, the skin is… like stone?"

Isabella's eyes flickered to Aro before focusing them back on Hawking. "Our skin is changed, no question about it. But we've determined the structure changes to a calcium-based shell over a flexible, fibrous web - very similar to that Kevlon material used in bullet-proof vests – just tougher. Injuries are possible, but the virus takes over and heals the wound – thereby protecting its host. And, in case Aro didn't tell you, we tend to stay out of direct sunlight not because it would burn us, but because this skin tends to reflect direct sunlight, giving us a sparkle effect that quite effectively distinguishes us from humans.

"So we avoid sunlight to keep from being obvious, not because it can hurt us. In fact, basking in the sun feels pretty good." She smiled at him. "We don't waste metabolic energy on maintaining our body temperature – it's not necessary for the functioning of our cells or internal organs. Chemical energy is stored in both the muscles and the venom that circulates in our bodies, so we don't lose energy with cold temperatures the way cold-blooded reptiles do. There is a glucose component in how our muscles function, but heat isn't necessary for metabolism – we pick up the glucose directly from the ingested blood."

I walked up behind my wife, resting my hand on her shoulder. She reached up, and covered my hand with her own. I couldn't be more proud of her than I was t this moment. But unfortunately, her reasoning had a serious flaw.

"Isabella," I said softly. "The scientific world has, for quite some time now, accepted one specific biological requirement for an organism to be considered alive. It must be able to reproduce."

She nodded, squeezing my hand. "And we do."

I started to speak when she spun around to face me. "No, Edward. I'm fully aware I can't conceive a child. But that doesn't mean we can't reproduce." She turned back to Dr Hawking, ignoring Aro's sputtering off to the side.

"Sir, we reproduce by introducing our venom, containing the virus, to other humans by biting them while still having the presence of mind to control ourselves and not kill them. For the most part, this means only vampires with enough self-control can reproduce themselves. And one would hope, if the vampire were to go through the effort of battling their instinctive drive to consume _all_ the blood, the human they choose to bite and allow to live is worthy of the evolutionary leap as well.

"In other words, survival of the species, and survival of the fittest." She grinned. "Darwin would be proud." She turned to Aro. "And my compliments to you and your brothers for one specific law. Children should never be turned. Waiting for intellectual maturation, as well as physical maturity, is critical for any future semblance of self-control."

The absolute silence in the room told me I wasn't the only one stunned by my wife's revelation. I sifted through her reasoning, and couldn't find fault with it, none at all. Had I been wrong all these years, considering myself to be a monster? Had we all succumbed to the assumption we were what legend said we were, rather than take a good hard look at what we _really_ were?

"I'd almost like to suggest," Isabella said to herself, "that we give ourselves a different name. We are not the vampires of myth."

"Wait," I mumbled, a thought occurring to me. "Does this mean the absence of this virus in the other universe is the reason they've never had vampires? Something as small as a virus?"

My thoughts were interrupted by a robotic monotone.

"What other universe?"

* * *

**A/N I'll have you all know, when Aro introduced Caius and Marcus, it took all my restraint not to type, "Hi. My name is Larry. This is my brother Darryl, and this is my other brother Darryl."**

**Some of you are old enough to understand that reference.**

**And just so you know, Douglas is being sued for child support. Henrietta is beside herself. Douglas insists it can't be him. Between you and I, I think it's a scam. He has something those whorish chipmunks want. It could be, they're after his nuts.**

***groan***

**Thank you, all of you, for taking this ride with me. Let me know what you think, k?**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

_**EAM POV**_

"_I'm standing near the bottom of the steps of the Capital." _The reporter looked solemn, sweeping her hand while the camera panned._ "The DC police have cordoned off this historic building from the public, including the media, while the only ones allowed inside are structural engineers. Geophysicists have been rechecking their data and instruments, and thus far they still haven't found any seismic activity that would have resulted in the crack in the dome. This iconic structure has stood the passage of time since it was re-built after the war of 1812…"_

I sighed and looked at Bella napping on the couch, at the dark circles under her eyes, her mouth pulled down into a frown – the whimpers as she slept tearing at my soul. There was nothing new from the droning reporter in too much makeup and too tight clothes reporting with her frown of concern that argued with her eyes that twinkled in excitement at being able to cover this story for CNN. I sat down heavily, and groaned. Rubbing my face and days-old stubble, I knew I should be napping along with Bella - now I'm starting to think in run-on sentences. By the time I looked back at the flatscreen the cameras had flickered back to the two quasi reporters at the news desk, trying their best to offer the banter of The View but instead doing nothing more than annoy their audience with drivel. I longed for the days of talking heads – at least they didn't roll their eyes on camera.

We were in a bunker under The White House. They didn't call it a bunker, they called it "The Situation Room." But it was what it was, and although I'd yet to meet the President I had to admit I was grudgingly impressed with the depth of Aro's political connections. He and his brothers were off doing God knows what while we sat in this room, guarded just outside the door by the Secret Service. I wasn't sure if we were being protected, or prisoners. In the long run, it didn't make a hell of a lot of difference.

The whirl of a fan cycling on interrupted my thoughts, and I looked up from my cheap coffee mug, decorated with some crap about some Air Force celebration that took place years before, with the molded in stamp proclaiming it was "Made in China" on the bottom, and turned my attention to Ed. For the past day he'd been curled in a chair in the corner, chin in his hands, mumbling on occasion but for the most part looking like the world had ended.

To him, and to other physicists around the world, perhaps it had. No one was taking the news of Stephen Hawking's death well – least of all my son.

"It couldn't have come at a worst time," he tried to explain, after the initial shock of the news worse off enough that he could talk. "There's no one even close to him, no one has a mind that works the way his did. Why?" He looked at me, pleading for an answer, as if somehow I – the only doctor in the family – could explain why Dr. Hawking's body chose now to shut down.

The truth is, I had no idea why he'd lived this long, and I wasn't alone in that opinion. Biographies, including details of how he'd suffered and for how long, clogged the airwaves until the next shiny toy caught the public's eye – like this disaster in Washington. None of them seemed aware we needed him more than we ever had.

"Ed, can you pick up any of his work? Understand some of his more radical theories enough to help?"

He shook his head, as depressed as I've ever seen him. "I don't know, Dad. I mean…"

He was interrupted by the blaring of the TV, announcing another alert. Alerts came often, not always with new news but with the intent of rehashing old shit in a way that kept the populace frightened enough to stay tuned to their channel. I reached for the remote when Ed grabbed my wrist, stopping me, and nodded at the screen.

"_Can you tell the viewers what happened, what you saw?"_

The camera switched to a young man who towered over the reporter - the picture shaking as the cameraman stepped back, needing distance to get both of them on the screen. Long black hair hung to his waist, his russet face was chiseled, dark eyes flashing between the reporter and the camera. I knew him. I hadn't seen him in over 15 years, but I knew him. He lived on the reservation; he was the kid who refused to allow Carlisle to treat his father. Jacob was his name, Jacob Black. I only saw him once in the parking lot of the hospital as he wheeled his paraplegic father to his car.

"Jacob?" Bella was awake and on her feet, her eyes squinting as she tried to shake off the remnants of her nap, her mouth dropping open. "Edward, I knew him when he was a kid, his father and mine were best friends. " She closed her mouth and gulped. "But Edward…"

Jacob turned away from the camera, scanning the distant mountains before dropping his eyes to the gash no more than 50 feet away from their feet. The ground had given way, trees ripped by the roots had cascaded into the new canyon, and previously hidden earth was exposed to the sunlight for the first time in a millennium. The cameraman followed his gaze, the lens zooming in at what looked like the houses and Matchbook cars, the three of us gasping when we all – as one – realized we were staring at the broken remnants of homes scattered and buried among the twisted trees. The camera cut back to Jacob in time to see him swallow, his mouth a straight line, his eyes narrowed. Without saying a word he turned, bent to retrieve an old, worn backpack at his feet, and walked away from the reporter.

The reporter frowned in irritation before he realized the cameraman had swung back to him, and he was live on the air. Quickly, his expression changed to one he thought looked like contrite sorrow as he stared into the camera's lens and raised the microphone to his mouth.

"_Word has just come in that this disaster was caused by what we've all feared since the quake and tsunami that devastated Japan. The Cascadia Fault had given way, resulting in what we're seeing here. At least half of the La Push Reservation has dropped into the Pacific, although the damage south of here, into Oregon and northern California is minimal. Seismologists are on their way, but sources say they don't know why the upper peninsula of Washington State was hit harder than the southern regions. I suppose we should be thankful. Had the full force hit California the potential loss of life would have been…"_

_Fucking bastards, all of them_. No question this reporter was more disappointed than relieved, deprived of his big story about thousands dead instead of the few hundred Quileute Indians that perished, not giving a shit about them. I reached for the remote again but paused before I hit the power button.

_All those people… dead. _ What the hell was going on? The damage to the Capital dome had resulted in some interior damage, but not a single injury. And what about that boy, Jacob? He was taller, much taller than I remembered, and far more muscular. He was a kid when I last saw him, a kid with more growing to do but still. This guy was a mountain on legs.

"Edward, did you see it? I mean… Jacob?"

I nodded. Aside than his ridiculous size and muscles, in spite of the 15 years that had gone by since I last saw him, he looked no older than Bella or I. Thinking back, he was a few years younger than us but that didn't explain why he had the face of a young man in his early twenties. In fact, he looked no older than our son... _and what the hell was that sound?_

Low and insistent, I first thought the ventilation fan had blown a bearing. I looked at the ceiling, felt the cool air on my face, and focused my hearing. That's when I heard it again, and spun around. Behind us, from his perch in the corner chair, was Ed - unseeing eyes staring at the television, hands in tight fists, knuckles white, eyes wide, nose flaring…

And lips pulled back from his teeth while he growled

'**********'

* * *

_**EAMC POV**_

_A shape shifter?_

We were gathered in the study of Aro's country home, watching the news reports of the Cascadia Fault slip in Washington State. Isabella was staring at the television, a look of shock on her face.

"How the hell did he get that big?" she muttered to herself. Stephen was sitting on the couch next to her, brow furrowed and deep in thought. It was one of his quieter moments, and we'd tentatively allowed him back into the study. We'd just had the flat screen replaced. Again.

The good news was, Aro had guards who had tremendous experience handling newborn vampires. The better news was, Stephen was rapidly gaining enough self-control that he had returned to his studies. And the greatest news was, as much as Aro tried to cajole him, tempt him, set gorgeous women ripe with liters of blood in front of him, Stephen requested, and reluctantly got, a herd of fat Angus in residence on the farm.

Aro shouldn't complain – the weekly deliveries of freshly hung and drained beef for the small villages in the area made him the equivalent of a local rock star – not that he fully understood what a rock star was. However, adulation was adulation. Aro was in good spirits most of the time.

It almost made up for his wife or one of his sycophants complaining about the expansion of Stephen's study - which now took the entire second floor of the huge farmhouse. You'd have thought this bunch knew better than to nag at Aro. After particularly rough days, I noticed a regular guard or two would go missing. Isabella and I studiously ignored the occasional reduction in local vampire personnel.

When Stephen wasn't having a newborn fit over something or another, we spent hours discussing the multi-faceted and multi-layered vampire brain - the impeccable logic available to those who put the effort into discipline. The almost utopian peace that came with knowing, as Bella said, we were evolved, many of us highly cultured – with the exception of the occasional stupid but now-missing guard, and the even more occasional bloodthirsty nomad. We discussed the talents that showed up here and there amongst vampires – most notably my telepathy and Alice's ability to traverse the ever-changing web of the future.

"How could you, all of you, been so foolishly reliant upon it?" he'd asked, when I attempted to explain why we thought there'd be no risk sending the message through the accelerator at CERN. I watched the flat screen, thinking about that conversation and how utterly moronic I felt under the stern gaze of the learned doctor. All of us were glued to the television, the camera panning the destruction. But playing in my mind, like film caught in a loop, was the tall, handsome shape shifter and _how the fuck does Isabella know him?_

My impeccable memory took inventory of the image of the man they'd just interviewed on the blasted television. Long dark hair, sparkling black eyes, high cheekbones and a nose that was reminiscent of the finest ancient Roman breeding – high bridged with a small hook. Full lips, russet skin – just the sort many women of the current generation would think of with an exaggerated mental gasp of, "Hawt!"

I shook my head. Certainly my Isabella wouldn't be amongst them. Isabella, with her refined taste in music and literature, her mature grasp on life even when she was still human… no, I'm being as Emmett might say, an idiot. Even without reading her mind I'd know that Isabella never had any interest in a dog like this. My eyes darted to her face as she waited for them to rerun the story, her eyes lighting up and rushing to the laptop when she realized the interview video might be available on CNN's website. I sighed and followed her, shuffling through the deep carpet, watching her excitement and wondering why the more she smiled the more I wanted to fling something at a wall.

_And what the blazes was this odd pain in my chest?_ I considered phoning Carlisle as it got worse. My breathing appeared a bit out of control as well. Could there be something in the local fauna?

I casually stood behind Isabella, my eyes surreptitiously glancing at what was on the laptop screen, and the small smile on her face as she looked at photos of the mutt seemed to coincide with my additional increase in respiration and the increased pain around my solar plexus. I wondered if Aro was spiking the deer.

"_You're mine."_

Isabella whirled in her seat to face me, her mouth dropped and her eyes wide. I suspect I may have, without my knowledge, given voice to that sentiment.

"Excuse me?" she asked.

Best to deflect. "Pardon me?"

"Why did you say that?"

"Say what?"

She narrowed her eyes and turned back to the laptop, pulling up Google, and searching on "Jacob Black." The odd pain near where my heart used to be got worse.

Trying to sound casual, I cleared my throat. "Isabella, how do you know this… boy?"

"We played together as kids," she responded with a dismissive wave of her hand, focusing on whatever she'd found.

They were childhood friends?

"I thought you lived with your mother?" I can control myself. I've inserted just the correct degree of sorrow in my tone since I referenced her departed mother.

This time she turned around and looked at me quizzically, head tilted, like I was a specimen under glass. "Edward, I did visit my father on occasion, and Jacob's dad was my father's best friend, so even though he was a couple of years younger, we played together." She shrugged, still giving me that puzzled look. "Why are you concerned?"

_I didn't know, why was I?_ My reaction was visceral, an odd clenching in my abdominal muscles, a slight acceleration of my breathing, a general sense of discomfort I'd never felt before. Turning back to the television, without really seeing it, images started to play out in my mind, scenes I was certain couldn't have happened. Isabella and this Jacob, perhaps before I met her, during one of the times she had visited, a young man's surging hormones as his body entered puberty, the availability of a beautiful girl, a friend, watching her blossom to womanhood.

Doubling over, the ache exploded like lightning just as felt a gentle hand on my arm, and while image after imagined image played in my head I was lead outside, across a meadow, and into an airy barn. Shafts of light poured onto the bleached wood floor, dust motes floated and glimmered as I allowed myself to be lead to a corner, to a stack of fresh and fragrant bales of hay.

"Edward?"

I turned to my wife, my Isabella, and all of my focus narrowed to her face, to her eyes. She wore a gentle smile as I gazed at her, trying to still my runaway imagination. I could see she was puzzling out my behavior, my bizarre reaction, and then there it was… that flash in her eyes, that flash that was there regardless of whether she was human or vampire. That flash like a deep spark when she made a connection, when she understood something - that flash was one of the first things I saw in her that sent me head over heels in love 15 years ago.

Her eyes softened before she wrapped her arms around me and gave me a tender hug. "Silly man," she teased. "Jacob meant nothing to me then, and means nothing to me now."

"Well, I know that," I huffed, unsure why I was reacting this way, the pain in my body slowly subsiding.

"Then you have no reason to be jealous, my love."

_Jealous?_ "Isabella, I'm not…" Was I? I scoured my memory, trying to remember if I'd ever felt jealousy before. I'd had decades of reading the minds of others, of knowing they believed themselves to be jealous, of understanding pain accompanied their thoughts, but I'd never…_ felt_ their thoughts, their emotions. I wasn't Jasper, it wasn't my talent.

"Of course you are," she whispered, her lips grazing my neck. "It's okay, although I promise, you have no reason to fear."

I nodded and hugged her tighter to me, trying to examine my emotions. Was it because he was now a handsome man? Perhaps it was because he had unfettered access to her while she was a blushing youth. Perhaps it had to do with the simple fact he was a mutt.

"Were you close to him?"

She shook her head and kissed my neck softly. "Two weeks a year doesn't make a friendship. He was a convenience for my father, a built-in playmate for my visits."

I exhaled and she shivered when my breath blew down her blouse, her tongue joining her lips on my neck, taking long licks, caressing and tasting. I opened my eyes long enough to take a quick look around, scanned for any thoughts that might intrude, and when all I heard were the faint whispers of distant minds, I reached down and slowly, one by one, unbuttoned her silk blouse – reaching through the opening to caress the skin of her firm breast, stroking the tip of her nipple.

Isabella moaned, the vibration a surge of electricity with a single destination in mind as I hardened to stone. Groaning, I released her breast and helped her unbutton my jeans, trying to keep from destroying them as we both tried to free my aching member.

"You," she cooed into my neck, her hand wrapping around me, sliding her smooth palm up and down my length. "You are the only man I've ever wanted, ever thought of this way, ever _will_ want," she emphasized with a squeeze. "You were my mate before I knew what it meant," she breathed into my mouth, her hand reaching under her dress to slide her panties down her smooth legs. Still tasting my breath she teased my lips as she straddled me, sliding down onto me with a growl.

"In fifteen years I haven't grown tired of your body, your mind… jealousy doesn't suit you."

I grabbed her hips and pushed her down, my lips moving across her neck, my hands reaching to knead her firm breasts, my teeth grazing along her satin skin.

"I'm yours, Edward," she sighed, increasing her speed. "I've been yours from the day I was born; I'll be yours when the stars fall from the sky."

I squeezed my eyes shut and thrust up into her, our whimpers echoing through the cavern of the barn, the dust motes bouncing in the beams of sunlight. And as Isabella and I moved faster and faster the dust motes closest to us were caught by our breaths, dancing to the rhythm of our lovemaking and exploding outward as I cried with release just as she clamped down hard.

Crushing her against my chest we held each other, listening to the last of the echoes of our bliss fade from the room. Caressing the gentle curves of her back, my mind wandered to Washington, to La Push, to the image of Jacob Black walking away from the reporter. He'd reached to the ground, outside the range of the camera, and as he walked away he'd adjusted a backpack, slipping the straps over his huge shoulders. It was a common act – made even more so in the past 40 years as rucksacks were popularized by the hippies, only to be followed by their children relishing the convenience of carrying schoolbooks on their backs rather than in their arms or in heavy briefcases. In fact, I'd paid so little attention that I'd failed to notice the pack was unzipped, allowing it to gap open. And as my mind's eye, with its perfect recall but unfortunately, less than perfect initial observation, I saw the unmistakable upper edge of a scarred, brown leather journal

* * *

**A/N Beat me, beat me! I know you want to do it!**

**I can no longer write at work, which has taken a huge chunk out of my available writing time. Then, just when I sit down and open Word and settle down, someone tells me about this great new fic and, before I know it, I'm reading and reading and, once again, I've written no more than a paragraph.**

**Honestly, there's no writer's block going on here. I know what I want to say, I know where this story is going. But god damn, there's such much good stuff out there to read!**

**And that, my friends, is a 100% honest answer. Let's hope the next chapter isn't as late. In fact, let's hope you're still out there, interested in this little ditty.**

**I'd like to take a moment to thank all those who have rec'd the parent of this sequel, and all the new readers that came to both stories through RAOR. You guys are a hoot **** And just so you know, I broke my personal rule about watching Network television last night, so I could see a young Rob in Goblet of Fire. Again. So tall… so fresh-faced…**


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